
Finally this slog is over and, like so many seasons in Milford, a pair of story arcs holding some promise end not with a bang but with a whimper. So let’s recap.
Milford had a slim chance of winning the Valley but somehow lost it without losing any more games, and we never learned how.* The Valley is apparently in a state where conference runners-up do not make the playdowns. Hence this game meant exactly diddly squat. It wouldn’t have mattered if the Mudlarks won, lost, held hands on the sideline or hissed and clawed at one another like cats.
So why is Rapson acting like Corina somehow saved the season? What exactly did she accomplish with her little insult fest at Casa Karenna pro tempore? Sending two boys home with fistfuls of brownies and sacks full of blue balls? All she did was continue to insult the two of them which, combined somehow with Gil’s dressing down, humbled them into being cheerleaders for the third-stringer-turned-starter. Maybe Rapp took a blow to the head during those last bruising runs to wind down the clock. That would explain his random pointing to the empty bleachers.
And what exactly did Corina accomplish for herself? She went out for the volleyball team, played liberal, and managed to get some of the football players to come watch the team play – which is more than we TWIMers can say as all of the volleyball game strips (save one panel on September 30) actually just showed the football players sitting in the bleachers. Was there any more character development for her after Phoebe showed her around Milford in the summer and nosy-ass Maureen the waitress set her on a course to True Standish’s mom, who somehow convinced Corina that her mom could get mental health support in Milford? Didn’t think so. Corina’s sole purpose in this arc was to serve as some kind of prize for the two quarterbacks and then as some kind of peacemaker to help them accept their sorry lot on the Milford bench. I’d call that yet another Bechdel fail in an endless string of Bechdel fails.
So is everybody all peace, love and understanding now? Are they all gonna go to The Bucket and trade one-liners over fries and milkshakes? Nah. Corina, sporting those hand-me-down Isotoner gloves Dan Marino gave her mom BITD, throws a tribute to former Mudlark hooper Chris Schuring by singing one word of Schuring’s new school’s alma mater.
See you all here on Monday. Don’t get your hopes up for a realistic plot.
* With the 19-13 loss to Jefferson played in a deluge it’s hard to point a finger at any one event that caused the loss. In the 42-37 loss to Madison, Thayer’s overthrow of a wide-open Tom Muench sealed the Mudlarks’ fate but completely overlooked in the post-game analysis was the fact that Milford blew a two-touchdown lead. Why wasn’t Gil’s sieve of a defense ever a bone of contention this season?